Daddio

The Magician and The Fool nominated for a 2009 Spectrum Award

2009-05-21T04:07:56Z

The Winners and Recommended Short List for the 2009 Gaylactic Spectrum Awards will be announced at Gaylaxicon 2009 in October 2009 in Minneapolis. (Which I will be attending!)

Here's the full awesome list of novel nominations (buddies and/or books I read are in bold):

Adijan and Her Genie by L-J Baker (Bedazzled Ink)
All The Windwracked Stars by Elizabeth Bear (Tor)
Alliance in Blood by Ariel Tachna (Dreamspinner Press)
The Archer's Heart by Astrid Amara (Blind Eye Books)
Blood Magic by Matthew Cook (Juno)
City of Ashes by Cassandra Clare (McElderry)
Covenant in Blood by Ariel Tachna (Dreamspinner Press)
Dragon & Fenyx: Called By Power by Auburnimp & Michael Barnette (Shadowfire Press)
Dragon & Fenyx 2: Swordbrothers by Auburnimp & Michael Barnette (Shadowfire Press)
Face Your Fears by Jeffrey L Stoddard (PD Publishing)
Half A Crown by Jo Walton (Tor)
Havemercy by Jaida Jones & Danielle Bennett (Bantam Spectra)
Hell and Earth by Elizabeth Bear (Roc)
Ink and Steel by Elizabeth Bear (Roc)
Jawk, Tales of the Chosen by Kayelle Allen (Liquid Silver Books)
The Love We Share Without Knowing by Christopher Barzak (Bantam)
The Magician and the Fool by Barth Anderson (Bantam)
My Hero by Tristram Burden (Rebel Satori Press)
Nights of Sin by Matthew Cook (Juno)
On Azrael's Wings by D. Jordan Redhawk (PD Publishing)
Santa Claus Conquers the Homophobes by Robert Devereaux (Booklocker)
Seti's Heart by Kiernan Kelly (Torquere)
Shadow's Return by Lynn Flewelling (Bantam Spectra)
Turnskin by Nicole Kimberling (Blind Eye Books)

Link to Gaylactic Spectrum site.

Barth on the Hunt

2009-05-19T19:50:38Z

LIGHTBREAKER by Mark Teppo, found in the wilds of DreamHaven Books, Minneapolis.

NORSE CODE by Greg van Eekhout, captured at Uncle Hugo's, Minneapolis.

The Glorious Wiscon Schedule of Barth

2009-05-16T20:45:53Z

Friday
Writing in the Recession Senate A
4:00 - 5:15 pm

Saturday
Post–Oil Economy Food Conference
2:30 - 3:45 pm

Sunday
Shadow over Powderhorn (Reading; see post below this one)
Room of One's Oen Bookstore
2:30 - 3:45 pm

Monday
The SignOut Capitol/Wisconsin
11:30 - 12:45 pm

Wiscon Reading

2009-05-16T20:03:10Z

Sunday, May 24
Room of One's Own
307 W. Johnson St.
Madison, WI

Provide the Caption

2009-05-16T12:50:15Z

Bahia de Banderas News review of The Patron Saint of Plagues

2009-05-15T19:08:20Z

"The future world painted by Anderson is a believable extension on the current state of affairs between the U.S. and Mexico: the shared border disintegrates into anarchy; governments turn tyrannically corrupt; cultural and racial tensions escalate to a fevered pitch." --Bahia de Banderas News (Puerta Vallarta)

Barth on Doug Lain's Diet Soap Podcast

2009-05-15T11:48:39Z

Doug Lain is a fun interviewer and I thoroughly enjoyed talking to him on his podcast for Diet Soap. Check it out. We talk about swine flu, tarot, and I rip the veil off Doug Lain's canard about his having "children."

Meanwhile, in H1N1 news, a new study suggests that Mexicans of mixed ancestry (roughly 80% of population) may have genetic predisposition for killer flu.

barthanderson @ 2009-05-13T15:50:00

2009-05-13T20:55:52Z

Husband of US flu victim considers wrongful death suit against Giant Pig Farm (TM).

The suit could spur a more aggressive epidemiological investigation. It also presupposes a source for the H1N1 outbreak, which is not helpful for such an investigation. An intriguing development, nonetheless.

Maybe Counselor Troi was Lynndie England?

2009-05-10T14:27:48Z

From Slate

There Are Four Lights!
Revisiting Star Trek: The Next Generation's eerily prescient torture episode

I'm not sure how eerily prescient that episode was. Some issues surrounding torture are described effectively, I suppose, and those issues are now swirling around a far more complicated and disturbing situation, namely, that the "good guys" not only tortured, but they did so as amatter of policy, the policy was defended publicly by the Vice President and others, the media and average citizens defended the practice, too, and, worst of all, the highest officials who ordered this policy, seemingly, weren't and won't be prosecuted.

TNG's depiction of these issues are actually too neat and gentrified to really capture the horror of where we are. Now, if a new, Vulcan-like leader of the Federation had learned that Picard was stacking Cardassians in naked human pyramids under orders, and then that wise, progressive leader turned a blind eye to the Federation policy compelling the Captain to do so -- well, that would have been prescient.

barthanderson @ 2009-05-06T14:59:00

2009-05-06T20:00:28Z

Why won't Doug Lain call me??

Save the Planet!

2009-05-06T15:36:40Z

Swinefighter -- The Swine Flu Game.

Pandemic

2009-05-05T10:21:05Z

The World Health Organization seems to be softening people up for a move to Level 6, that is, calling H1N1 a pandemic.

Let's review:

Endemic means that a disease is native to a particular region. So what does pandemic mean?

Right. It's not a reference to the death count or severity of the outbreak. It's a reference to where H1N1 can be found. WHO is wise to spell this out for an information-hungry public ahead of time.

Meanwhile, check out this article (via H5N1 blog) SARS Sleuth Tracks H1N1, Criticizes WHO: One virus hunter's take on how important it is for WHO to accurately get their levels right during an outbreak.

Get Your Tapaboca On

2009-05-04T11:32:41Z

Swine Flu Starts a Trend in Mexico: Face Masks (LA Times)

Newspapers here have carried graphics showing how to turn a piece of scrap cloth into a mask. Some people have tried to add a splash of personality by painting their masks with skeleton faces or colorful butterflies...The tapaboca phenomenon in Mexico has yielded some incongruous images: the motorist with face covered, though alone in his car; the couple aboard a motorcycle, masked but not wearing helmets; sunbathers wearing swimsuits and surgical masks.

Newspaper columnist Juan Villoro said the mask, by revealing only the eyes, added a touch of the exotic to Mexican life. "Those who are not good-looking at least have become mysterious," he quipped in Friday's edition of the Reforma newspaper.

It's telling that this fad has been indulged in Japan for decades.

Man Bites Dog

2009-05-03T02:43:29Z

Pig Herd Contracts H1N1 from Farmhand

Patron Saint on The Uptake

2009-05-02T15:17:44Z

I'll be on The Uptake, live, at 2pm-ish tomoorw (Sunday, May3) talking about The Patron Saint of Plagues and H1N1 swine flu. Huge hat tip to the Irish-Jewish-Lesbian mafia (seanmmurphy and, especially, lyda222 ) for the hook up.

If you miss it, don't sweat. The Uptake will no doubt archive it. I'll keep you apprised.

Meanwhile, it seems like some others are starting to draw the lines between PSOP and the "current unpleasantness" (to quote Willy Wonka).

Texas cancels school competitions

2009-04-30T15:00:12Z

Via darinbradley

Texas cancels all school competitions through May 11.

Of note in this article, the 23-month-old boy who died in Houston was from Mexico City and had underlying health problems. Terrible as that is, those circumstances make the case seem rather unusual and incidental for a "US confirmed death" and has to be of some relief to public health officials in the States.

Plus, the article describes a fascinating, city council level discussion on the immigration issue vis a vis H1N1.

barthanderson @ 2009-04-29T06:51:00

2009-04-29T11:52:34Z

First US death attributed to H1N1.

A cross-section, top to bottom look at a hot zone

2009-04-29T03:24:16Z

Mexico and the World Health Organization better get on the same page about the number of H1N1-related deaths in Mexico, pronto. Here's what the Mexican federal government is saying (from the Sydney Morning Herald):

Mexico's Health Minister, Jose Angel Cordova, told reporters that the probable death toll from swine flu in his country had risen from 152 to 159.

Meanwhile, WHO is sticking to official, lab tested, and confirmed cases only:

"That figure[150+ deaths ~b.] is not a figure that's come from the World Health Organisation and, I repeat, the death toll is seven."

Awesome!

Well, they both better have a long talk with this guy, Dr Antonio Chavez, a specialist in respiratory diseases at the Mexico National Institute of Health, from Mexico City:

"The truth is that mortality is even higher than what is being reported by the authorities, at least in the hospital where I work. It is killing three to four patients daily, and it has been going on for more than three weeks."

And there you have a peek into the stressed out, confused, red-lined craziness inside a hot zone. It's also why everyone has to be a little skeptical of the news they're reading out of Mexico.

barthanderson @ 2009-04-28T20:02:00

2009-04-29T01:03:39Z

When is Swine Flu Human Flu?

2009-04-28T21:08:27Z

It's a nightmare trying to Google decent information on swine flu right now. SO. I beseech thee, holy intarwebs! Hear my query!

In avian flu, the key "antigenic shift" that can rearrange a poultry-to-poultry flu virus into a poultry-to-human virus (or human-to-human flu virus) occurs, typically, when there is prolonged contact between birds and humans. That's why there was so much attention paid to Indonesia over the last few years, because there is a cultural predisposition for owning flocks of chickens in that country.

Is it the same thing with swine flu? Is it contact between pigs and humans? Or does the shift happen solely among pigs and the humans are irrelevant? What are the prime conditions under which there might be an antigenic shift in pig-to-pig swine flu, making it into a human friendly virus?

Epidemic Errata w/ Update

2009-04-28T15:58:59Z

Patient Zero from Oaxaca, nowhere near the big, evil, stinky Smithfield CAFO in state of Veracruz.

UPDATE. A more thorough piece here: Earliest Known Mexican Patient Lived No Where Near Smithfield CAFO. (Are there 2 sicknesses at work in this outbreak?)

Mass Grave Found in Downtown Montgomery, Alabama

And from LOLSwineFloo:

j/k

Vintage PSA re Swine Flu (1976)

2009-04-27T21:42:00Z

Only 20 Confirmed H1N1 Cases in Mexico City

2009-04-27T20:47:09Z

The Washington Post is making interesting distinctions in its most recent article about swine flu in Mexico City. In the lede, they report:

The suspected death toll from the outbreak of swine flu in Mexico rose Monday to 149 people as health authorities cancelled all schools across the country until May 6.

Then, two grafs later, the writer says:

[Mexico's Minister of Health Jose Cordova] said 20 of the deaths so far have been confirmed as swine flu, but that just two laboratories in the country, one in Mexico City and one in the state of Veracruz, are able to confirm this new strain.

149 suspected deaths. 20 confirmations. I hadn't heard that before. One has to wonder how many of those 149 cases are really the result of H1N1, especially in a chaotic and stressful situation that Cordova describes as "the most critical moment of this epidemic."

So. What kills H1N1 sufferers?

Most of the fatal cases involved extensive lung damage, requiring doctors to prescribe mechanical breathing assistance. Exactly what caused the lung damage is not known.

Extensive lung damage -- that's what happens in the advanced stages of infections from flu. It's hard to imagine that isn't H1N1, lab confirmations aside.

But who lives and why? It does seem to rest on who receives care early:

Mexican officials said there is no shortage of antiviral medication. The difference between who lives and dies seems largely linked to how quickly patients receive treatment, officials said.

That would seem to mark the difference between an alerted American health care system and a surprised, overwhelmed Mexican system. The H1N1 sufferers up here are getting a head start on treatment that their Mexican counterparts did not receive.

Two Halves of Barth's Brain Gather Their Talking Points

2009-04-27T17:56:41Z

OK, brains, here's the question: Is H1N1 swine flu something to get scared about? Arrange your talking points!

The Cynical BS Detector Half's Talking Points

*Seasonal flu mortality is, on average, 36,000 deaths per year in the US. So far? No deaths for le pig in America -- though over 100 in Mexico is nothing to sneeze at. (Sorry about the pun. Hey, I'm a cynic!)

* No deaths outside Mexico means that H1N1 is probably shifting or drifting itself into impotency.

* No deaths outside Mexico means that the alerts are working: the combo of forewarned health care providers and early, serious care is saving lives.

* I'm not completely convinced that H1N1 is really spreading human-to-human, and if it is, its communicability is incredibly low.

* We've got enough effective vaccine to protect the population.

The Patron Saint of Plagues Half's Talking Points

* We don't know anything about this virus. For all we know, it has already spread beyond control in America and the first wave of fatalities is still on its way.

* We don't know what H1N1 will do once it starts bouncing around, spreading from human to human. That's when flu viruses can go through a rapid change (antigenic shift or drift) and spread more easily, become more virulent.

* Even if a wave of fatalities is staved off, the Zeitgest of Fear will set off panicked food buying, causing shortages and mayhem.

* We don't have enough effective vaccine to protect the population. Even if we did, this virus could mutate into something unstoppable quite easily. (It already jumped from birds to pigs to humans, after all.)

Right now, the cynic is winning.

What IS swine flu?

2009-04-27T13:12:59Z

An intelligent description of what swine flu is, how it works on a cellular level, and how it spreads.

Of note:

Influenza virus A [like the current A/H1N1. ~b.] causes yearly epidemics that result in illness for humans, pigs, and domestic poultry. We now know that intra-species transmission is the norm. Indeed, pandemics are global epidemics among humans caused by the transmission of novel influenza A viruses generated via inter-species transmission. Pandemics are no longer thought of as tornadoes that suddenly thrust themselves upon human populations. Rather, we now know that herald epidemics in non-human and human species occur for variable amounts of time before a pandemic takes root. Thus, surveillance among human, swine and bird populations has become essential for early detection of viruses with pandemic potential and for initiation of prevention efforts, particularly vaccine development.